Reverse Expectations

[Dannager]

Not really interested in dealing with ridiculous slippery slope fallacies.

That's too bad. Face it: every game in existence curtails player choice. That's what rules are - essentially limitations on what you can or cannot do.

For instance (and just to use one example from one game that pretty much everyone will be familiar with), in 3rd Edition spellcasters are limited to a certain number of spells per day. Once you've exhausted those, you no longer have the choice of casting further spells (unless you've bought expendable items like scrolls or wands, but those too will eventually run out). Does this removal of a single element of player choice mean that the game has removed all elements of player choice? Of course not.

Making the argument that level scaling removes all player choice (or is tantamount to railroading - along with the thoroughly discredited implication that the practice of railroading is somehow a lesser breed of gaming style) is not just resorting to hyperbole, it's also demonstrably false.

So, I'll ask again: Are you sure you don't just find the idea of level scaling unpalatable for reasons largely unrelated to railroading?

 

[Aus_Snow]

However, there is one thing that you cannot (and many would say should not) get rid of; while playing, your character gets stronger.

There are a number of RPGs that don't do that, actually.

 

[Beginning of the End]

Scaling the power up doesn't.

So, I'll ask again: Are you sure you don't just find the idea of level scaling unpalatable for reasons largely unrelated to railroading?

...

So you're a big fan of the non sequitur, I see. Tell me, have you stopped beating your wife yet?

Making the argument that level scaling removes all player choice

Oh look. It's more of your slippery slope crap.

 

[Dannager]

...

So you're a big fan of the non sequitur, I see. Tell me, have you stopped beating your wife yet?

Haha, woah there.

I think you might be confusing a loaded question with a non sequitur. They are very much not interchangeable.

Oh look. It's more of your slippery slope crap.

Now I'm not even sure that you know what a slippery slope is, either. A slippery slope would be a line of reasoning used to justify a course of action wherein that same line of reasoning can continue to be applied far beyond the scope of the course of action in question, and can potentially lead to unforeseen and unwanted future outcomes.

I'm having a difficult time seeing how this discussion involves a slippery slope, except, ironically, on your part - you have claimed that level scaling removes player choice and is tantamount to railroading, with the (independent) implications that level scaling and railroading are both bad/undesirable. I have pointed out that the fact that level scaling (arguably) removes player choice is not sufficient to call it railroading, because every single rule can be viewed through the lens of curtailing player choice and yet you haven't labeled every single rule as railroading.

From where I stand, it appears that you are against level scaling because it removes player choice, and the removal of player choice is railroading. By that same logic, not allowing a wizard to continue casting spells after he has cast a certain number is also removing player choice, and should also be seen as railroading, and should, therefore, be seen as bad/undesirable by you as well (along with pretty much every other game rule out there).

We are forced to one of two conclusions - either you consider all game rules bad/undesirable on the same level that you consider level scaling bad/undesirable, or your reasons for finding level scaling unappealing are not the reasons you have provided (or, perhaps, your reasons are in need of significant clarification).

So, I'll ask for a third time: Are you sure you don't just find the idea of level scaling unpalatable for reasons largely unrelated to railroading?

That's not a tough question to answer, and it's only "loaded" in the sense that it assumes you find level scaling unpalatable. You haven't outright said as much, but your posts certainly seem to be coming from that perspective.

 

[Beginning of the End]

Haha, woah there.

I think you might be confusing a loaded question with a non sequitur. They are very much not interchangeable.

You're under the impression that we were talking about you beating up your wife before I asked a loaded question about it as a non sequitur? What thread are you reading, exactly?

A slippery slope would be a line of reasoning used to justify a course of action wherein that same line of reasoning can continue to be applied far beyond the scope of the course of action in question, and can potentially lead to unforeseen and unwanted future outcomes.

Lemme know when you find a quote of me saying "level scaling removes all player choice". Actually, go ahead and find a quote of me saying "level scaling removes player choice".

(Hint: You're going to have a difficult time since I actually said the exact opposite of that.)

I'm not sure what you think you're accomplishing here. If you ever become interested in discussing things I actually said, lemme know.

 

[Kaodi]

Something else that may be a real change from the way things go... levelling down. How you justify it would have to be really different, like maybe power sources are weakening over time, maybe they have been affected by a curse, but it would certainly change things up to have low level characters with amazing resources by the end...

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Something else that may be a real change from the way things go... levelling down. How you justify it would have to be really different, like maybe power sources are weakening over time, maybe they have been affected by a curse, but it would certainly change things up to have low level characters with amazing resources by the end...

How about a fantasy game with these two characteristics:

1. Mundane options are fairly realistic (or at least sword and sorcerery gritty realistic). Real power comes via magic, whether mage powers or magical enhancement to a warrier. But the universe is skewed against power. It is always more risky than what you get, and the more powerful it becomes, the more this is true. It's not cosmic power, itty bitty living space. it's cosmic power, the cosmos rips out your heart and eats it.

2. Mechanically, one of the ways this is managed and limited is that the more a given power is used, the less powerful it becomes. But this in no way reduces the risk. It's pretty much worth it at first ...

So the net result is that if you can, for example, wipe out all the other cultists of the Mad God Grog, wait a few months, set up a huge ritual to appease him--you'll have great power for awhile. You might even not lose much in the process. But every time you go to that well, you've got a little less than you had before. The temptation for others to take this from you, grab a piece themselves, etc. is immense. And your luck with Grog is going to run out eventually. It is inherently unstable.

In this same environment, if you can ignore that temptation, work really hard on the gritty mundane side, you'll be better off in the long run. Well, assuming some magic user drunk with power doesn't nail you in the meantime. You'll probably have to selectively take risks with magic, because the universe is so stacked against you.

This leaves how much power is "lost" up to each character--or at least each character can choose how much risk to take.

 

[Ariosto]

What if it was really easy to be a 1st level adventurer (or the equivalent in games without levels), but as you leveled up, enemies of your level grew stronger than you faster than you, and your chance of dying increased.

In OD&D and 1st ed. AD&D, this is basically what happens to magic-users.

Versus other magic-users, the ability to dish out hurt increases more rapidly than the ability to take it (especially from 11th level on, with another jump from 16th in OD&D or 21st in AD&D).

Monsters and other characters also gain hit points and chances to hit in armed combat more rapidly, while the m-u's chances of landing a spell against them keep declining.

That, however, is an exception to the general rule and offset by the m-u's ever increasing versatility. The class is a gamble, but when it pays off the figure can -- in combination with other types, and played with intelligence -- minimize the risk of direct confrontation that is so deadly for it.

(It's still pretty crazy at levels at which your rivals have the likes of clone, imprisonment, power word - kill and wish in ample supply.)

Overall, the rule of getting more hit points and better saves reduces mortality by giving on average more chances to notice and get out of an unfavorable situation. I think this is highly desirable in a game that combines

-- a focus on very often doing potentially deadly things with characters (such as getting into fights)
-- with a focus as well on long term character development.

The scope is increased by the growing availability of risks that are even more manageable because they entail opposition of lower levels. An 8th-level 'superhero' can fairly reliably cut down and put to flight platoons of normal men en route to a showdown with the E.H.P..

 

[Ariosto]

the thoroughly discredited implication that the practice of railroading is somehow a lesser breed of gaming style... is not just resorting to hyperbole, it's also demonstrably false.

How is an opinion on a matter of taste 'discredited' or "demonstrably false"?

You can like railroading as much as you please, and you can also dig disco, but there's no priority to your preference.

 

[pemerton]

If you're taking away the player's ability to choose the danger level of the challenges they're facing, then you're removing their meaningful choices. If you're removing their meaningful choices, you're railroading them. QED.

Removing a meaningful choice that the players have (the choice to attack something comically less or more powerful than they are) is not the same as removing all meaningful choice the players have.

Not allowing a player to start play as an epic-level wizard is removing a meaningful choice as well, but I hardly think you'd call that railroading.

To add to Dannager's reply - many people play RPGs, and even D&D, in which the main focus of play is not about overcoming chalenges (ie they don't play in a gamist/step-on-up style).

For those players, danger level of challenges is not an especially meaningful matter. Rather, other elements of challenges/situations become meaningful (eg with whom do we choose to ally, whom to fight, what sacrifices to make, what values to uphold, etc).

As Victim pointed out on this thread, if you want to play a game in which players can express moral or thematic commitments via their choices of which situations to engage, and how to engage those situations, then maintaining a parity in the likelihood of success is actually a virtue - because if some options are more or less dangerous than others, than the players have to trade off game-mechanical expedience against thematic concern, which can tend to undemine thematic/value-oriented play and turn it towards gamist play instead.